ABSTRACT
It has been made dramatically clear in earlier chapters that citizenship, if it is equated with the development of democracy and human rights, is primarily a western notion. Globalization affects the whole world, albeit unevenly. This chapter attempts a preliminary discussion of the evolution of both globalization and citizenship in one part of the non-western world: the Asia-Pacific region. This region is chosen as an example because of its size and its significant role in current globalization processes. The discussion will, we hope, suggest how enormous and culturally specific the problems of various world regions are where citizenship is concerned. Any project that attempts to extend citizenship to the global realm to cope with the new global problems faces a mammoth task. Indeed, as the final chapter of this book will discuss, conditions in many areas are so chaotic that it is not even possible to think in terms of democratic citizenship, since functioning states and the rule of law are virtually absent.
